I know I've had many great mentors and role models and guys to look up to; guys I've learned a lot from so I know how to approach being that guy and I've been doing it for a long time.
I guess rock stars are role models for the kids who listen to that music. My role models have all been geologists - you know, the guys who are doing fieldwork until they're 70.
I am starting to realize that a lot of guys look up to me, ... Older guys, and even younger guys, are asking me questions and [they] ask me about how to handle situations. Im young, but that leadership role has been on me so I need to live up to it.
Im just trying to be positive. I like the guys (Im) around. Even though were not at the record Id like to be, even after a loss, guys are mad, but then we have fun and you move on. They look up to me. Ive been around eight years. A lot of these guys were in junior high or high school when I came into the NBA. I see how much of an influence I am off the court. I try to be careful how I approach things on and off the court, because I know these guys are watching.
There aren't that many female role models in science. There are a couple of women, but mostly you've got Neil deGrasse Tyson, Richard Dawkins, Lawrence Krauss - they're all guys. Bill Nye the Science Guy. I love that guy, but it's all guys.
The success I had as a player, or the career I had as a player, is often based on the guys you play beside, the guys you play with. Playing on the offensive line, you're only as good as your weakest guy up front. I was blessed to play with a lot of guys for a long time.
Search for role models you can look up to and people who take an interest in your career. But here's an important warning: you don't have to have mentors who look like you. Had I been waiting for a black, female Soviet specialist mentor, I would still be waiting. Most of my mentors have been old white men, because they were the ones who dominated my field.
The only reason we make good role models is because you guys look up to athletes and we can influence you in positive ways. But the real role models should be your parents and teachers!
A lot of my friends and guys who I have watched and grew up with and who have been at my house are Hall of Famers, and I just know them as Ozzie Smith, Eddie Murray, Kirby Puckett, Dave Winfield... I know these guys like my older brothers and uncles, the guys who took care of me.
I got to playing villains-I don't know how. I think it's like anything else, in the movies in particular that if you establish yourself as something and you're lucky enough to keep getting hired. You know, there are guys who play the guy who gets the girl, guys who are the best friend of that guy, there's the funny guy, the villain.
There's been a lot of coaches, a lot of guys at Stanford, a lot of guys at my high school. A lot of guys in the NBA. Bill Cartwright comes to mind, a lot of people I've learned from.
I think any time you bring those guys in, one with a lot of playoff experience, with rings - those guys won - guys in the locker room gravitate towards those guys. Those guys have been there, so there's a lot that they can teach the guys.
I've always had trouble with long guys because as a shorter guy I have smaller explosive movements and a lot of long guys I can get trapped inside of them.
I'm more attracted to the bad guys. Why? Because in real life, I don't know any good guys. I know okay guys. I know polite guys. I know people who can control themselves.
I grew up in business at a time where there weren't very many female role models, and so in the early days, we wore little bow ties like the guys, and we talked about the Army even though we weren't in the Army. And the reality was that wasn't the right way to approach the business world.
I've talked to Frank Gore, Willis McGahee - different guys who had similar injuries to me. Those guys have been great mentors to me and kept me motivated.
When you think about the guys who started Twitter, and the Google guys, and the Facebook guys and the Napster guys, and the Microsoft guys, and the Dell guys and the Instagram guys, it's all guys. The girls, they're being left behind.